Passionate about IP! Since June 2003 the IPKat weblog has covered copyright, patent, trade mark, info-tech and privacy/confidentiality issues from a mainly UK and European perspective. The team is David Brophy, Birgit Clark, Merpel, Jeremy Phillips, Eleonora Rosati, Darren Smyth, Annsley Merelle Ward and Neil J. Wilkof. You're welcome to read, post comments and participate in our community. You can email the Kats here

For the half-year to 30 June 2015, the IPKat's regular team is supplemented by contributions from guest bloggers Suleman Ali, Tom Ohta and Valentina Torelli.

Regular round-ups of the previous week's blogposts are kindly compiled by Alberto Bellan.

Monday, 13 March 2006

The attention of the IPKat has been drawn to the plight of geofftech (a.k.a. Geoff Marshall), who has had a spot of bother with the legal department of London Transport over his charmingly inoffensive and non-commercial use of the LT roundel (above, left). The Kat wonders whether this sort of thing destroys more goodwill than legitimate use of the roundel can ever create.

Geoff holds the world record, ratified by the Guinness World Records, for getting round the London Underground system in the shortest possible time. As a regular victim of the Northern Line, the IPKat commends Geoff's alacrity: he too tries to get off in the shortest possible time, alas to little avail.

BAILII, the British and Irish Legal Information Institute, is frequently mentioned by the IPKat as a source of free full-text judicial rulings on intellectual property matters. The service goes much wider than British IP, however, since it links in with the World Legal Information Institute (WLII) in order to provide "free independent and non-profit access to worldwide law".

The way things work in the UK, decided cases are, upon completion, given a descriptive neutral citation that will remain constant, regardless of the series of law reports in which they may subsequently be reported. Then they are (at least in theory) given to BAILII, which lists them by court but provides a full-site search facility. The system is not yet entirely perfect - some Patents Court cases are listed under 'Patents Court' while others are listed under 'Chancery Division' (the Patents Court being part of the Chancery Division - but it is improving all the time. Figures, illustrations and artwork are now generally accessible along with the text of decisions that refers to them; this is of great and obvious value for patent, trade mark and design litigation.

The IPKat, who is the world's fourth highest source of links to BAILII after Google, Her Majesty's Courts Service and Austlii (the Australian Legal Information Institute), thanks Professor Philip Leith (Queen's University, Belfast) for prompting him to post this blog. Professor Leith is a trustee of BAILII.